Pre Race

Well here we go again. The nerves are setting with thoughts about tomorrow's Half Marathon in Barrie dominating my mind. This time there is a bit of a different feeling after looking at the field and noticing that I have a good chance of winning the event. Of course, not recognizing any names in the field doesn't necessarily mean that it is an automatic win. In fact, in long distance races there is no such thing as absolute or predictable. That is one of the quirks about this type of event, it is so unpredictable. In the buildup to a race, you try to make running at race pace as comfortable as possible, but any runner knows your feel and comfort level from one run to next changes almost as often as the weather as of recently.

And on that note, tomorrow is supposed to be a nasty one. The temperature will be comfortable at 16, but there is a 90% chance of showers (10mm) and some chance of thunderstorms. But, the weather will not discourage me from running as hard and fast as possible. The reason, I will never miss a day of training or workout because of poor weather, is because I always say if it happens on race day I know I can handle it. However with the field, and the possibility of poor weather I hope to PB, but I don't necessarily expect to as I did going into Mississauga. That being said, every wednesday before a race I do a key workout called a pyramid where I run 200m, 400m, 600, 800, 1000, 800, 600, 400, then 200 with only 200m in between each interval. It is a great high intensity workout that totals about 14k with warmup and cooldown and 5k high intensity work. Anyways, this Wednesday I ran the fastest intervals I ever have run since started to do this workout about 8 months ago. The 200s were done at 2:50/km pace, 400s at 2:53/km, the 600s at 3:01/km, the 800s at 3:04/km, and the 1k in 3:03. All of this times are on anywhere from 10-a whole 15 seconds faster per/km pace than doing it before mississauga. Throughout the race I will imagine myself on the track at St.Es running this workout and hopefully that will allow me to push through the inevitable tough stretches. Another quirk about the half or full marathon is that unlike races like the 3000 or 1500, which I ran in high school, you know before you even start that there will be some stretches of the race where you need to grind and battle. Anyways, before I start I will keep the Kenyan saying in my mind to boost my confidence, "Train hard, win easy."

One last note this will be the swan song for my now decorated and remarkable adizero adios. Its been a great spring season let's end it with a bang.